Happy Demon Dusters: Week 1 + 2 and Statement

Dusters (week 1)

First week for making the dusters was super tricky. From the feedback I had gotten, I have 2 strong ideas that really shine through my concepts. I think picking in-between the two ideas is going to be the hard part for me, I either can push far into the direction of the idea of personification in these dusters (examples being the Happy Demon and Skull dusters), or focusing on the aspect of the dusters being more dangerous to hold than use. (like the Cthulu of Cult dusters).

Thanks to the feedback I was given, I felt a push to really flesh out my ideas. So I started to mess around with three concepts. Cthulu, Happy Demon, and Skull. What I ended up with was mixing the Cthulu and Skull dusters to make one unique duster, I really had in mind my two ideas for this one. I really wanted to have a personified object, that also tackled the idea of the reverse knuckleduster. I also ended keeping the Happy Demon because it captures the idea of the personification perfectly, I made just a couple tweaks and kept the sketch mostly as is.

To start, I did my happy demon dusters. I had to just measure my fingers, but in a certain way. I measured how bug they are when there are in a fist and how big the fist is width, and height wise for the overall knuckles. The happy demon doesn't have the palm part so I didn't have to worry about measurements for there. Instead, I added a goatee to the demon, in the shape of spikes on the bottom, to kinda refence my other idea.

Once I figured out my measurements, I started to apply the numbers to the 3d model. I began with the smiley face, starting with the eyes. It was a bit tricky figuring out a shape for the happy face. Like eye distance from one hole to another, where the happy face should be, how the horns will protrude out. It definitely took a  little longer than I expected, but I think that's mostly because of me wanting my model to be just right.

It was the same with the skullthulu, A lot of the shapes on my model, I just had to feel out, constantly zoom in and out to see scale and such. I used some measurements from my happy face to the skull, mostly finger and fist measurements. But because of the unique shape of the skull (especially the palm piece) I had to really mess around with the lines spacing on the whole thing. I had to make sure it looks right too, there was a lot of times where the palm piece just looked ugly or too big for the duster so there was a lot of adjustments to that spot specifically. Had to really look at the curves on the skull duster and see how the spacing affected each part of the work and the whole duster overall. 

Here are some pics of the process I had to go through to get the models I wanted. Most of it is the documentation of the skullthulu. I also added the reference pages I was going to use for my printed things.

Duster (Week 2)

I the second week, I had a lotta trouble trying to print my reference sheets. Most of it had to do with the virus and not feeling safe really. But I did slap my models into Shapeways to see if there were any issues. I did have issues with sharp edged that I'm probably going to ask questions about, but that was pretty much it. These sharp parts seemed only to be affected at the very end of these sharp points (see below these few pics).

I felt really strongly to do the Demon Duster, mostly because I seen the red option for the versatile plastic. I think having this duster in red would really add to giving this object the personality it needs, pushing the demon idea even more. I think the red would just make it pop more too.

My other option is that I wanted to make the skull duster in some type of metal, metal because it really adds to idea of this object being kinda a self-hazard to hold. I think seeing it metal too would just give it it's own feeling, that industrial kind of attitude it needs.

So as a final object, it was struggle to choose. I ended just picking the Happy Demon because I felt really strongly about the idea here, and there is definitely a need that I have this things physical, and I think just knowing it would be in red really adds to that need. When I compare these ideas, I definitely feel like the material for the happy face feels a lot more suitable and geared towards the idea of the playfulness of what I wanted to achieve and giving the object it's personification.

Here are is the link to the product on the shapeways website HERE. I will also be 3d printing out these objects to see them in the physical, so I will also send progress on that end of things.

STATEMENT: The Happy Demon Duster is a personification of the knuckle duster. It is an art sculpture, made specifically so it would not able to hold to use since the eyes have the cartoony spikes in them. Instead, I wanted my object to explore concepts of social commentary (weapons, our relationship to each other, hostility, etc.) and how a simple object meant for a specific purpose can hold so many connotations and lead the mind to certain ideas.

You can create a demon (red) or a succubis (purple) for the material colors. It will be printed in versatile plastic for price purposes.